Museum of Ethnography and Folk Art in the Toldalagi Palace, Târgu Mureș

The Toldalagi Palace stands at no. 11 Piața Trandafirilor, in the centre of Târgu Mureș, and houses the Ethnography and Folk Art Section of the Mureș County Museum. The palace is a class A historic monument (LMI code MS-II-m-A-15553). The Mureș County Museum has several sections in different buildings: the Art Section in the Palace of Culture (no. 1 Piața Victoriei), the Natural Sciences Section (no. 24 Strada Horea), the History and Archaeology Section in the Târgu Mureș Citadel, and the archaeological park at Călugăreni. It was the first large aristocratic palace built in the town after the Royal Court of Justice (Tabla Regească) moved here. It was commissioned by Count László Toldalagi, an assessor of that court; work began in 1759 and was completed in the early 1770s with the rear wing. The designer was János Luidor, with Pál Schmidt as second contractor, and the statues and carved details are by Anton Schuchbauer. The main façade, with six richly decorated window bays, carries in its attic the stone coats of arms of the Toldalagi and Wass families, framed by Rococo stucco. Nineteenth-century stoves were brought in during 1960-1961, some of them from the Haller Castle at Sânpaul. The museum's first ethnographic objects were acquired by Aurel Filimon, and the first ethnography exhibition opened in 1921 in the Palace of Culture. The collection was gradually expanded to cover all the ethnographic areas of Mureș: the Transylvanian Plain, the Târnave valleys, the Gurghiu Valley, the Upper Mureș Valley and the Niraj Valley, with objects of Romanian, Hungarian and Saxon folk culture. Since 1984 the section has been housed in the Toldalagi Palace. The holdings include folk costume and household textiles, wooden objects, pottery, metal and bone pieces, religious objects, icons on wood and on glass, and contemporary work. The permanent exhibition "At the Fair. Mureș Markets and Rural Life" is complemented by temporary exhibitions. The museum is open Tuesday to Sunday and closed on Mondays.